Nintendo 64, usually called the N64, is the third offspring of Nintendo in the home videoigrovyh systems. Nintendo 64 came on June 23, 1996 in Japan, on September 29, 1996 in North America on March 1, 1997 in Europe and Australia and on September 1, 1997 in France. In Japan, and North America console was launched only two developed games : Super Mario 64 and PilotWings 64, while in Europe was the third game Star Wars : Shadows of the Empire. When the market Nintendo 64 cost $ 199.

The first Nintendo 64 was available to the public on November 24, 1995 as the Nintendo Ultra 64 at the seventh annual exhibition Shoshinkayskoy software products in Japan (although the first photos appeared in American magazines in June 1993).

During development, N64 had the code name "Project Reality". The name "Project Reality" has come from inside Nintendo speculation that the device can generate an image (CGI) along with the then advanced computers, the name was later changed to Nintendo Ultra 64, pointing to the 64 bit processor, and the first in February 1996 Nintendo pushed the word "Ultra" from the title for five months before the official release in Japan.

After first announcing the two companies Rareware and Midway arcade games developed Killer Instinct and Cruis'n USA, which according to the developers used equipment Ultra 64. Indeed, it was far from the truth, because arcades used hard disks and processors TMS. Killer Instinct was the most advanced games of their time in graphical terms.

The first system, which had declared itself a 64 bit Atari Jaguar (although this is still disputed, as it had two 32-bit processor, but the graphics were 64-bit).

Nintendo 64 was developed by Silicon Graphics Inc. N64 was the first console that supports and anti mipmapping. Libraries fifth Consoles was a lack of texture memory (memory cartridges and system memory). This forced developers to use low-resolution textures, which were very lubricated use bilinear filter.

Nintendo 64 was last adopted a system of cartridges for storing games. Imaging has the following merits :

- ROM cartridges have a very high download speed, it is possible to avoid loading screens, which often appear on the Playstation, but not at N64.

- ROM cartridges are very complex and roads in forgery, unlike CD, which you then had little trouble, it is possible to combat piracy.

in cartridges can add additional chips (such as FP), thus adding the necessary properties of the device in the design of new games. Recall that the technology has been applied to the SNES.

- Many cartridges have batteries and are capable saved directly in the cartridge is permitted to do without costly external memory cards. In some cases, using EEPROM.

In 1988, Nintendo has signed an agreement with Sony to develop a CD-ROM supplement to the SNES. Later, Nintendo pulled out of the agreement because Sony insisted on the exclusion of all revenues collected from the licensing of games that go on CD. Sony also plans to release combination SNES / CD-ROM in one device, which was to be named Playstation. Sony later called that name its 32-bit console that Nintendo happened. Nintendo tried sued Sony, but later renounced its claims. Later, she moved to the Danish electronic giant Philips to develop a CD-ROM SNES, but it came to nothing lead.

Cartridges can draw more polygons, but not allowed to store large quantities. Later become more voluminous ROM s (such as Resident Evil 2), but it was too late, and expensive. At the time rivals Nintendo, Sega and Sony already using their decks CD-ROMs. CDs were a cheap production and distribution, thereby lowering the costs to develop games as well as their value. As a result, many developers who have traditionally supported Nintendo perebegat competitors, as well as the development of games for prefixes CD offered much more money. Battle against disk cartridges came to a climax with the publication of Final Fantasy VII. Despite the fact that all six parts before leaving on platforms from Nintendo, producer Squaresoft chose to issue a seventh of the Playstation. Developed for N64 cartridges cost $ 25, while the CD-ROM cost 10 cents! Therefore disks for Playstation rarely expensive cost $ 50 and cartridges at N64 exceeded $ 70-80 billion mark.

Despite the disastrous situation Nintendo has been able to maintain the system. At the end of the era of third-generation Playstation prefixes ranked first, while the N64 second (51% and 40% respectively). Much of the success is due to the presence of N64 Spliced brands such as Mario and Zelda, which have so far remained exclusive.

Nintendo also managed to attract more senior audience because of games like GoldenEye 007, Resident Evil 2, Shadow Man, Doom and Quake II 64.

In 2001, the Nintendo 64 was filled GameCube Consoles. And even at the console Nintendo relinquished best CD technology. It used but based on DVD technology, but totally incompatible optical disks for the GameCube.